


hold me close (and let me hear your heartbeat)

by ScissorLord



Category: S.C.I.谜案集 | S.C.I. Mystery (TV)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Pining, Unrequited Love, Zhan Yao is just kinda dumb, plot twist its actually requited
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:21:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23988793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScissorLord/pseuds/ScissorLord
Summary: Zhan Yao thinks about Feng Jie, and the way Bai Yutong’s eyes had always tracked him across the room as if they were riveted by his movement. He thinks of the way the two of them were close, how they looked at each other and how they had talked often, leaning in close to share words and soft touches. He thinks about Feng Jie and knows what he feels is jealousy for a dead man, but Bai Yutong is mourning and Zhan Yao knows better than to want what he can’t have.OrThe Tuxi case happens. Zhan Yao and Bai Yutong grow closer in the aftermath.
Relationships: Bai Yutong/Zhan Yao, background Bai Chi/Zhao Zhen
Comments: 22
Kudos: 214
Collections: Sci1





	hold me close (and let me hear your heartbeat)

**Author's Note:**

> Quarantine got me out here binging dramas and S.C.I. is criminally underrated. I can't believe how small the amount of works this fandom has in English is. Obviously I had to take matters into my own grubby little hands, so here it is.
> 
> This is largely based on the show, as I have only read the part of the novel that kitsune-translates on tumblr has gone through, so some of this might not be accurate to the novel.

There is something wrong about Feng Jie and Zhan Yao knows it.

He tells himself this when Feng Jie sits too close to Bai Yutong, touches him casually with far too much ease, shows up at the crime scene with him like he has the right to stand at the white-clad man’s side. He tells himself this when Bai Yutong smiles at him, too familiar and fond, when he smiles and laughs and calls him “A-Jie” like it’s the easiest thing in the world. He tells himself this when he has to push down that dark feeling of bitter possessiveness that tries to claw its way up his throat when he sees the two of them together.

There is something wrong about Feng Jie and Zhan Yao is going to prove it, even if Bai Yutong has refused to stand by his side.

Some distant part of himself acknowledges the fact that Bai Yutong’s refusal to cooperate with him isn’t just because of Feng Jie, that there is some blame that rests on his shoulders for fixating far too much on the seemingly supernatural part of this case. Bai Yutong had never believed in such things, and Zhan Yao knows that normally he would not put as much thought into them either if it had not been for Zhao Jue’s statement to him in the archives that the supernatural is real.

Yutong would kick his ass if he knew Zhan Yao is putting so much belief in what Zhao Jue said.

But Bai Yutong is investigating on his own, with that suspicious Feng Jie at his side, and he can’t scold Zhan Yao for talking to Zhao Jue. Zhan Yao, as of right now, is on his own, and he’ll take all the help he can get.

——

(He’s sitting across from his informant in the dim lighting of the restaurant, trying to be causal.

“I haven’t asked yet, what’s your name?”

“My name is Zhan Yutong,” he says, and he tries not to think about how it sounds. How he misses the name’s _actual_ owner, how Zhan Yutong sounds right coming out of his mouth even if it feels wrong applied to him. Maybe he should have tried Bai Yao out instead, but he tries not to think about that either.

He wonders if Bai Yutong would like hearing it, too.)

——

Feng Jie is responsible for the murder of two people. He dies for the attempted murder of the third. Zhan Yao, sitting at Bai Yutong’s bedside and trying not to feel helpless, can’t feel anything but relieved for that. Feng Jie was important to Bai Yutong, who had gotten shot for it. If Feng Jie had lived, Zhan Yao has no doubts that Bai Yutong would have fought tooth and nail to lessen Feng Jie’s sentence and get him help instead of an execution.

Zhan Yao is not that kind. Feng Jie shot Yutong, and that is more than enough for Zhan Yao to be glad he is dead.

“I placed above him in everything but marksmanship,” Yutong had said to him, voice sad. “I am alive because Feng Jie did not want to kill me.”

Zhan Yao does not care what Feng Jie’s marksmanship scores were. The bullet was five centimeters off from Bai Yutong’s heart, and if it weren’t for Yutong’s instance then Zhan Yao would be noting on the case file that Feng Jie attempted to murder two people in the forest, and not just one.

Watching the sleeping form of Bai Yutong in the bed in front of him, Zhan Yao thinks about how, if Feng Jie was still alive, that he might not be for very long. Execution or no execution, his life expectancy after hurting Bai Yutong would have been extremely short. Zhan Yao does not want to be more like Zhao Jue than he already is, but sometimes during times like this Zhan Yao can almost understand him. It is a thought that scares him less than he would like to admit.

Bai Yutong is important to Zhan Yao. He does not want to know how far he would go if something truly bad happened to his mouse.

——

Bai Yutong has pretty much moved into Zhan Yao’s apartment at this point, so Zhan Yao hopes that his urge to fuss over Yutong isn’t too obvious when he says he’ll drive them home. Bai Yutong gives him a vaguely irritated look but hands over the keys easily, the doctor having already warned against moving his shoulder.

Zhan Yao slides into the unfamiliar driver’s side while Bai Yutong leans back in the passenger seat. The role reversal makes something sour a bit in Zhan Yao’s stomach, but he doesn’t mention it.

“Just because I’m not allowed to move my arm much doesn’t mean I’m letting you cook,” Bai Yutong says as Zhan Yao starts the engine. “It’s already bad enough that you’re going to have to drive me everywhere, I’m not letting you give me food poisoning as well.”

“You shouldn’t be cooking.”

“I can figure something out with my other arm, I’m not letting you kill me with your horrible cooking and I’m not submitting on takeout for the next week,” Yutong gives him a look that could only be described as vaguely threatening. Zhan Yao isn’t sure if he should be relieved because Bai Yutong’s food is absolutely amazing and he won’t have to live without it for a week, or insulted because at the very least he has figured out how to use the rice cooker without lighting something on fire now.

Zhan Yao sighs. “Ok, fine, but if I see you using your left arm I’m kicking you out of the kitchen and I’m ordering soup from that place down the street.”

Bai Yutong wrinkles his nose at him, which is way cuter than it has any right to be. Zhan Yao knows for a fact that Bai Yutong actually likes the aforementioned soup but would never choose it over his own cooking out of pride. Zhan Yao’s kitchen has been fully stocked with food ever since Yutong had started living with him, so he anticipates eating something tonight made out of the easiest ingredients to deal with when cooking one-handed.

“Hurry up and get us home, cat,” Bai Yutong grumbles, looking out the window peevishly. It is, as most things Yutong does are, ridiculously cute.

Zhan Yao gives him a small smile and begins driving back to his apartment, making sure to follow every speed limit to Bai Yutong’s growing frustration.

——

If Zhan Yao had thought they had slipped into a domestic ease before, then they had taken it to an all new level now. They had known each other all their lives, could read each other as instinctively as they could read themselves, and that understanding makes itself apparent in the way they act after the incident.

When Bai Yutong begins to start reaching for something with his injured arm, Zhan Yao grabs it for him almost without looking, moving into the other man’s space with ease before the motion could cause him pain. When Zhan Yao is thirsty, Yutong mysteriously materializes at his side with a glass of water or tea, seemingly being able to know exactly when he needs it. They go through their routines together instead of separately now, bursting teeth next to each other in tandem as they prepare for bed, Zhan Yao sliding into bed and folding the covers next to him back so it’s easier for Bai Yutong to do the same.

It is the kind of casual togetherness that makes Zhan Yao want more. In the soft light of his living room, light coming from the TV illuminates the planes of Bai Yutong’s face. The light dances off of his high cheekbones, gets lost in the cut of his jaw. His eyes, fixated on whatever action nonsense happening on the screen, are soft, his posture relaxed and easy. He’s in pajamas, just an undershirt and boxers. It is so hard to see him like this normally, so loose and at home. At work he carries too much steel in his spine, maintains that image of perfect untouchable white. Here he is content to sit on Zhan Yao’s couch, feet up on the table with Zhan you stretched out next to him, thighs toughing.

This is a side of Bai Yutong that only Zhan Yao gets to see. He treasures it, holds it close, wants _more_.

Sitting there, book on his lap forgotten, Zhan Yao wants to kiss Bai Yutong.

He doesn’t.

——

“I dated him for a while, you know,” Bai Yutong tells him one night, whispered into the dark. “Feng Jie. I dunno, it was just, at the police academy, we were partnered up for a lot of things. I guess it was because we were both at the top of our class. We spent a lot of time together, so we just kinda… fell into place.”

Zhan Yao isn’t sure what to say, doesn’t know if he could say anything past the ball of bitterness stuck in his throat. Instead, he reaches out and rubs a soothing hand up and down Yutong’s back, feeling the taut muscles there ease slightly.

Bai Yutong lets out a shuddering breath. “I didn’t know he had a girlfriend. I wouldn’t have… if I had known, things would have gone differently between us. Things had always felt wrong somehow, like we didn’t fit together quite right. I suppose that was why.”

Every time Zhan Yao thinks that Feng Jie has hurt Bai Yutong enough, something else like this comes to light. As he rubs Bai Yutong’s back in the dark, he wonders what Feng Jie ever did to earn his place in Bai Yutong’s heart.

“What happened was not your fault,” he finally murmurs. “There is no way you could have known.”

“Yeah,” Yutong says, “I know. But I still wonder what could have happened if things were different. Maybe if I had never been with him, if things had been different would I have listened to your suspicions sooner? Or would he have been able to fool me all the same?”

Zhan Yao has to beat down the hatred he feels at Feng Jie for making Bai Yutong like this, quiet and unsure and doubtful in himself. “Xiao-Bai. Yutong. The decisions you made, to go by innocent until proven guilty and to stick to your moral code, those are your own. The decisions he made, to kill those people and lie to you about his past, those were his own. You can’t control the actions he took and the choices he made, and you did the best you could with the information you had at the time.”

Bai Yutong is quiet for a moment before he flips over to face Zhan Yao, back no longer to him. “I should have trusted _you_ , though.”

“You were right not to. I was being irrational, and my blame for Feng Jie wasn’t entirely rooted in fact.”

“Still,” even in the dark Zhan Yao can see Bai Yutong’s dark eyes, watching him shrewdly, “you were right. Thanks for not holding that over me. I got too caught up in everything and it was just easier to dismiss everything you said as psychological bullshit like I used to.”

“Half of what comes out of my mouth is psychological bullshit, though. Luckily you’re getting better at listening to the non-bullshit half,” Zhan Yao says wryly.

It startles a laugh out of Bai Yutong, so Zhan Yao would consider it a victory. As a wordless response, Bai Yutong reaches out and pulls Zhan Yao closer, tucking the professor’s face against his chest and resting his chin against the top of Zhan Yao’s head. A little startled, but no less pleased, Zhan Yao hopes that Bai Yutong can’t feel how fast his heart is beating. With his head resting against Bai Yutong’s really nice chest, he can hear the other man’s heart thumping away. A little quick, but steady and reassuring nonetheless, the sound lulls Zhan Yao into a peaceful sleep.

——

(One day, at the office, Bai Chi approaches him.

“Dr. Zhan,” he says, quiet as always, “can I ask you a question?”

Zhan Yao smiles at him kindly. “Of course. What do you want to ask?”

“How… how do you make living with Bai Sir work?” The timid boy is flushing slightly, fidgeting in place. He looks like he would rather be anywhere else but here, yet still wants the answer enough to stay.

“May I ask why you want to know?”

“I… well… it’s just that Zhao Zhen asked me to move in with him. And I’m scared, but I still… I still want to do it,” Bai Chi looks him in the eye, shaky but resolute. “I want to know how you manage living with someone you like.”

Zhan Yao’s heart catches in his throat and he can’t help but stare. He forgets, sometimes, how perceptive Bai Chi can be.

Bai Chi begins to look panicked at his silence. “Did I overstep? I’m so sorry sir, I didn’t mean any disrespect!”

“No, no, you’re fine,” Zhan Yao counts himself lucky that Bai Yutong had been called out of the office to help his sister. “I just wasn’t expecting that, is all.”

Some of the fear melts off Bai Chi’s face, but he still looks uneasy, so Zhan Yao does his best to come up with an answer.

“I can’t say I’m managing perfectly, with Bai Yutong,” he says. “But I can say that I have been… I have liked Yutong for a long time. Moving in with him only enhanced that. When you live with someone, there will be pieces of them that only you will see, and vice versa. It takes a lot of trust to let someone into your home, where you feel safe, and expect them to help you stay safe and be safe in return. There is a lot of trust there, intimacy. So if you trust Zhao Zhen and you want to spend more time with him enough to go through with this… then I think you can just be yourself and relax around him and maybe he’ll do the same in return.”

Bai Chi takes this in silently, nodding pensively. When he finally meets Zhan Yao’s gaze again, he is pleased to see that there is something determined shining in them.

“Thank you, Dr. Zhan. I think I know what I want to do, now,” he says.

Zhan Yao smiles again, fond. “Of course. I am happy to talk to you any time, Bai Chi.”

The boy smiles back, moving toward the door. Just before he reaches it, he turns back.

“Dr. Zhan… I think you should tell Bai Sir how you feel,” he tells the older man quietly. “I think it would turn out well for both of you.”

Zhan Yao thinks about Feng Jie, and the way Bai Yutong’s eyes had always tracked him across the room as if they were riveted by his movement. He thinks of the way the two of them were close, how they looked at each other and how they had talked often, leaning in close to share words and soft touches. He thinks about Feng Jie and knows what he feels is jealousy for a dead man, but Bai Yutong is mourning and Zhan Yao knows better than to want what he can’t have.

He thinks about late night talks, about shared meals. He thinks about the sound of Bai Yutong’s heartbeat in his ears and the feeling of strong arms wrapped around him.

“Maybe,” is all he says.)

——

Cuddling at night turns into a more regular thing between him and Bai Yutong. Some nights, after crawling into bed, Zhan Yao will turn so his back is facing Bai Yutong, who will immediately mold himself there as the big spoon. After hard cases, Bai Yutong will flop onto the bed and lay bonelessly on his back, and Zhan Yao will curl up close to him, pillowing his head on his chest and evening out his breathing for Yutong to match it until they both succumb to slumber. Sometimes they’ll fall asleep together on the couch after watching a movie, pressed up against each other under a blanket, tucked together.

They never talk about it, just add it to the list of things that grow between them. Zhan Yao almost wishes that they would actually have a conversation about this, but each small gesture of affection is slowly making him doubt more and more that the feelings Bai Yutong has for him are strictly platonic, and he knows a conversation about cuddling would give him either confirmation or rejection on that front. He’s not sure he’s ready for either.

It starts happening more at work as well. Not cuddling, necessarily, but touching. Bai Yutong’s hands will find their ways to his shoulders, his back, his waist when they’re standing next to each other during conversations. When they run from danger Yutong will grab his wrist to make sure he’s there, maybe a result of his concussion during the Tuxi case, but it makes Zhan Yao feel safer all the same. When they check security footage at Jiang Ling’s desk, Bai Yutong will lean over him to do so, pressed slightly against his back.

The other members of the office notice it, but don’t mention it, at least not verbally. Wang Shao and Zhao Fu both grin at him, the first time they see it, but don’t say a word. Ma Han silently places a cup of tea on his desk one day after giving him a meaningful look, which Zhan Yao supposes he has no proof is connected, but thinks it is nonetheless. Gongsun obviously sees it, but is luckily tired enough of meddling to spare Zhan Yao any mind. Jiang Ling starts calling him instead of Bai Yutong when she thinks they’re in situations that require more subtlety than Yutong’s ringtone, operating under the correct assumption that they tend to not leave each other’s sides on cases anymore. Bai Chi just gives him thumbs ups of encouragement when Bai Yutong isn’t looking, seeming a bit more cheerful and open after their talk.

They’re subtle changes, but positive ones, and Zhan Yao can’t say that he minds. He takes it as a stamp of approval from them; the members of Bai Yutong’s team that followed him (Bai Chi doesn’t fall into that, but he is Yutong’s cousin) showing their support of this maybe relationship that is blossoming between them. He feels a bit more accepted into the team.

——

On a case they’re struggling with, they run into Zhao Jue.

Zhan Yao is never sure what the older man wants, always seeming to act on his own agenda that is too complex to figure out. He worries about the strange fascination he has taken with them, with Zhan Yao in particular, but he’s also been helpful on some of their cases at this point and he can’t jeopardize that. He ignores the fact that this man, a man who killed hundreds with the power of psychological suggestion, has treated him kinder and is likely closer to him than his own father is.

Zhao Jue smiles at them, clearly having expected them even if they had not expected him. Wonderful. Zhan Yao can see Bai Yutong resisting the urge to draw his gun on the other man, but they’re in a public space and they can’t afford that kind of commotion. Zhao Jue probably planned it that way.

The older man takes a step forward toward Zhan Yao, ripping a snarl out of Bai Yutong as he grabs Zhan Yao’s wrist and pushes him behind him in a protective gesture. Zhao Jue stops in his tracks immediately, but Zhan Yao could practically see the tense vibration of Bai Yutong’s muscles as he glares the criminal down, a muscle jumping at his clenched jaw.

Zhan Yao thoughtlessly places a calming hand on Bai Yutong’s shoulder before realizing the company they were in front of and stiffening. Surely Zhao Jue had already picked up on the close relationship between the two of them, especially with Bai Yutong’s protective tendencies, but this was a bit more than he was comfortable showing him. Personal connections and feelings were things that could be exploited by the enemy, and Zhan Yao did not want Bai Yutong harmed any more than he already has been on the job.

Before he can withdraw his hand from its resting place on Bai Yutong’s shoulder, Zhao Jue tilts his head at Zhan Yao. He gives him a long look, one that was all too considering and makes the hair on the back of Zhan Yao’s neck stand up in apprehension.

“Are you happy?” Zhao Jue asks.

“What?” Bai Yutong says in return, confusion coloring his tone. Zhan Yao frowns, wanting an answer as well, but Zhao Jue does not repeat himself, staring at Zhan Yao fixedly.

“I am,” Zhan Yao says carefully. “I am happy.”

Zhao Jue’s smile only grows wider, and if it wasn’t Zhao Jue then Zhan Yao would say that the look in his eyes grew softer somehow. “Good. Relationships like the one you have should be treasured. If you lose those, you will lose part of yourself.” He then nods at Bai Yutong, who was still looking confused.

Zhan Yao distantly registers that this is some weird way of Zhao Jue showing his acceptance for their relationship. He isn’t sure if the psychological mastermind had read their relationship as romantic or as platonic, something Zhan Yao had been struggling with recently as well, but apparently what he had seen he approved of.

Zhao Jue goes on to give them some cryptic help on their case, as well as a name of someone who may be connected, before dissolving into the crowd. Bai Yutong shakes his head in a mix of frustration and resignation to this kind of thing, perhaps getting used to Zhao Jue in his own way, before turning around to head back to the car. He gently grabs Zhan Yao’s hand to tug him away from where he had been standing.

Bai Yutong squeezes his hand gently and Zhan Yao squeezes back. Zhao Jue’s behavior could wait.

——

When things finally come to a head, it is not in the middle of danger or a fast, adrenaline-filled rush before the conclusion of a case. It is simple, an easy moment that feels like it fits perfectly into the domestic narrative they have made.

“What do you want for dinner?” Bai Yutong calls to him from the kitchen, clearly looking through the refrigerator at what they have.

Zhan Yao takes a moment to pretend he’s considering the question. “Seafood.”

“You really do act like a cat, you know,” Bai Yutong teases. “I probably could have guessed you wanted seafood, I feel like you’ve asked for fish every day this week.”

“Rude,” Zhan Yao says, standing up from the couch and making his way into the kitchen. It is well after work, both of their jackets discarded to somewhere else in the apartment, still in their work clothes but more relaxed. “The other day I asked for Italian food.”

“Italian food with shrimp in it still counts as seafood, kitten.”

Zhan Yao laughs, leaning against the countertop. Bai Yutong turns at the sound, a familiar expression of fondness on his face. They look at each other for a long moment, content in the silence, before Zhan Yao gestures at the still-open refrigerator. “Well? Are you going to tell me no?”

Bai Yutong lets out a little snort of amusement.

“I could never,” he says quietly. Then, in one smooth movement, he steps forward into Zhan Yao’s space and kisses him.

It is a short, chaste thing, the simple press of lips against each other before Bai Yutong is pulling away. Zhan Yao reaches out to gently cup his face before leaning in to kiss him in return, equally brief and soft.

“You have no idea,” Bai Yutong says, “how long I have wanted to do that.”

This startles a laugh out of Zhan Yao, and he can see how the sound makes Bai Yutong preen. “Surely not as long as I have wanted to.”

They are still impossibly close, separated just enough to be able to look into each other’s eyes. At some point, Bai Yutong’s hands have come to settle at Zhan Yao’s waist, while Zhan Yao is still cupping the other man’s cheek.

“Definitely since before I went to the police academy,” Bai Yutong whispers. “Definitely before you left to go study abroad. Think you can beat that?”

“I have wanted to kiss you ever since we were fifteen,” Zhan Yao says. “I remember there was an incident, I got stuck up in a tree and couldn’t bring myself to come down. Instead of trying to coax me down from below you climbed up and sat next to me until I wasn’t afraid. I wanted to kiss you then.”

“I remember that. Why didn’t you?”

Zhan Yao exhales a shaky breath, flushing slightly. “I was scared. I didn’t even know if you liked boys, much less if you liked me. I didn’t even realize you were interested in men until I saw you around Feng Jie.”

“Part of the reason I started dating Feng Jie at the academy was because I was trying to get over you,” Bai Yutong lets out a little laugh. “You were gone and I wasn’t sure if you were ever coming back. I can’t believe that we missed so much time doing this.”

Zhan Yao smiles, Bai Yutong matching it.

“Well,” he says, ”we have all the time in the world now.”

——

And they do.

**Author's Note:**

> Lowkey this entire fic just changes its tone partway through from being jealous of Feng Jie and focusing on that to just being soft domestic fluff and honestly? It's what I deserve.
> 
> I'm probably going to end up writing a full Bai Chi/Zhao Zhen fic at some point because they are honestly so cute I can't stand it.
> 
> If you want to scream at me about these boys I am available to yell on tumblr as darthbagel2332, even though I haven't posted any S.C.I. things there.


End file.
